U.S. ambassador: Iran failed to declare all chemical weapons to global agency

2 Min Read

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Iran has not declared all its chemical weapons capabilities to the global chemical weapons agency in The Hague, in violation of an international non-proliferation convention, the U.S. ambassador to the organisation said on Thursday.

Ambassador Kenneth Ward told a meeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) that Iran had failed to report a production facility for the filling of aerial bombs and maintains a programme to obtain banned toxic munitions.

There was no immediate Iranian reaction to the remarks.

“The United States has had longstanding concerns that Iran maintains a chemical weapons programme that it has failed to declare to the OPCW,” Ward said at an OPCW conference.

“The United States is also concerned that Iran is also pursuing central nervous system-acting chemicals for offensive purposes,” he said.

Iran failed to declare the transfer of chemical weapons to Libya in the 1980s, even after Libya declared them to the OPCW in 2011, he said.

Ward cited the discovery of chemical-filled artillery projectiles, mortars and aerial bombs of Iranian origin as proof that Iran did not fully disclose its capabilities.

Reporting by Anthony Deutsch, Editing by Gareth Jones, William Maclean